


The Correlation of Salvation and Love

by kissoffools



Category: Asuncion RPF
Genre: Developing Relationship, Hijinks & Shenanigans, M/M, Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-16
Updated: 2011-12-16
Packaged: 2017-10-27 09:57:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,416
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/294480
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kissoffools/pseuds/kissoffools
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>"And the other thing about being around Justin, about being sucked into his infectious and interesting ways, is that Jesse doesn’t mind it one bit."</i> One night off, four Village bars, and an indescribable shift.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Correlation of Salvation and Love

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Emilys_List](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Emilys_List/gifts).



***

Justin and Jesse start the night off at the Dirty Bird.

Which has always sounded far more like a strip club than a chicken restaurant to Jesse, but the food is cheap and Justin likes that they raise their chicken humanely, so that’s where they go.

“You got a salad?” Justin asks when they settle onto the counter stools by the window.

“Veg,” Jesse says, raising his eyebrows. “Remember?”

Justin raises his eyebrows right back. “Not even chicken?”

Jesse can’t help the chuckle that escapes him. He’s known Justin for years, but somehow that one always slips his mind. “Chickens are animals too, in case you failed kindergarten.”

“Christ,” Justin says, shaking his head as he dips his cornbread in gravy. “I didn’t think, dude, sorry.”

Jesse pokes a tomato with his fork and holds back the _do you ever think?_ that’s on the tip of his tongue. “It’s fine,” he says instead. “I like their dressing.”

And it is fine, for Jesse. Staying away from meat is by and large his only rule – if it wasn’t formerly walking, he’ll eat it. And Justin loves this chicken; Jesse knows Justin loves this chicken. So a salad, for one night, is fine.

Justin has a piece of fried chicken in his mouth when he says, “Man, we’ll go wherever you want after this. Anywhere! The night is young and you, Jesse Eisenberg, are our guide!” His arm waves around as he shouts, and Jesse thinks he’s lucky that Justin doesn’t spray chicken on his shirt.

The smile forms on Jesse’s face before he can help himself. _Crazy, ridiculous bastard,_ he thinks fondly.

“Do you want to call Camille?” Jesse asks. “I mean, I know it’s her night off too, and this isn’t an official cast thing or anything, but…”

Justin shrugs and pulls out his phone. “I’ll text her,” he says, tapping away. “Although she actually has other friends that she might want to see, unlike some people…”

“Shut up,” Jesse says, rolling his eyes. “You’re the one who called _me_.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Justin shifts on his stool, shoving his phone back into his jeans pocket. “I told her to text us if she’s bored and we’ll meet up. I also told her you’re eating like a bird.”

“I’m _not_ -”

“I’m teasing,” Justin says with a little smile, and Jesse relaxes. Sometimes he misses the subtleties.

“But seriously, Jess, we can go get you other food after,” Justin adds. “Wherever you want to go, I’m there. After I eat the fuck out of this chicken.”

***

This is how they end up at Ulysses.

Jesse’s never been, but he picks it mostly for the name - _named after the James Joyce novel, how iconic_ \- and he’s heard their drinks are good and the staff is friendly and maybe there will be some intelligent conversation thrown in there too. The front of the bar is nondescript and the paint around the doorframe is peeling. Jesse’s expecting quiet; he’s expecting understated.

He is not expecting a strip show.

Justin’s shoulders shake with laughter as they hover just inside the door. There are girls dancing on tables and men with beer glasses and tumblers of brandy and Jesse almost wants to step back outside to check the sign because he does _not_ remember there being naked women advertised anywhere.

Not that he has a problem with naked women, of course. But it’s a far cry from the ode to Modernist literature he’s expecting.

“Did you know?” Jesse has to almost yell in Justin’s ear to be heard over the music. His lips bump clumsily against Justin’s earlobe and he can feel the way he’s vibrating.

“No, Jess, I swear,” Justin says, but he’s still chuckling so he’s clearly enjoying himself. “Was this your plan? Eat a salad so you can stay skinny for the ladies?” He clumsily grabs Jesse around the waist and it kind of tickles.

“You boys better grab a seat!” An incredibly put-together twenty-something carrying a tray of drinks pauses on her way across the room. “It’s still early, but it’ll fill up by ten.”

Her skirt is short but she’s wearing glasses, and that’s interesting to Jesse. He wonders if maybe she signed up to work here because she thought it would be stimulating and educational, too. Then Jesse thinks _that’s awful, how stereotypical, she’s both attractive and smart and she has every right to work here if she wants to_ , and then he thinks _none of the other girls are wearing glasses so maybe that’s her way of being an individual in a homogenous collective_ and then he realizes he’s in over his head and he might need a drink.

“Do you want to?” Jesse calls up to Justin. “It doesn’t seem like Camille’s going to come meet us, so…” Justin raises his eyebrows and Jesse nods towards some empty seats and then Jesse thinks Justin’s eyebrows are close to flying off his forehead.

“I – stay?” Justin’s tone is disbelieving, and that kind of hurts Jesse. _Is me wanting to stay at a strip club really so shocking?_

A part of Jesse sort of likes the idea of being shocking.

“Come on,” he says, and heads towards a pair of chairs without looking back.

When he sits and signals a waitress over, Justin flops down beside him and pushes his wallet away.

“Two rye and gingers,” he says to the waitress – not the brunette with the glasses, and Jesse’s kind of disappointed because he sort of wanted to talk to her more, but oh well. Justin tosses Jesse a little smile. “It’s on me.”

***

They wait until they make it to 55 Bar before starting in on their fifth rye.

The thing about being around Justin, Jesse thinks over the amateur jazz coming from the corner of the room, is that he often ends up doing things that are out of character.

He doesn’t really know how that happens – Justin texts him with something simple, something like _hey man, wanna get coffee?_ and the next thing Jesse knows it’s six hours later and they’re hanging out with an Olsen twin in a dark bar and bumping elbows with the faux-intellectuals at NYU. ( _His sister once asked him if random groups of celebrities really do sporadically hang out like they’re waiting for the paps from Us Weekly to show up, and he hated that he was able to tell her that yes, sometimes they actually do._ ) There’s just something about Justin, something infectious and interesting and Jesse always finds himself sucked up into it before realizing it’s even happened.

And the other thing about being around Justin, about being sucked into his infectious and interesting ways, is that Jesse doesn’t mind it one bit.

“Maybe it’s the booze,” Jesse announces, more to himself than anything else, and Justin cocks his head.

“Maybe what’s the booze?”

Jesse finishes off his drink and forgets that they weren’t having a conversation out loud before he spoke. “Maybe that’s why I like hanging out with you so much,” he says. “Because there’s always booze at some point and then it always gets fun.”

“There’s not always booze!” Justin protests with a laugh, and he sounds far more sober than Jesse, which is just not fair given that they’ve had the same number of drinks. _Curse my small size._

“There’s usually booze.” Jesse stirs the ice around in his glass with his tiny straw. He loves how bars always have such tiny straws.

“Still,” Justin says. “It has to be the booze? It can’t be my charming personality or my rugged handsomeness?”

Jesse barks out a laugh, and he thinks there’s been a grin on his face for a while now. “It’s those too, of course.”

“Good,” Justin says, satisfied. He drains his drink and slams it down on the bar. He eyes the saxophone wailing away in the corner.

“This music sucks. Where to next, Captain?”

***

They smoke a joint in the alley behind Duplex.

It’s Justin’s lighter and Justin’s papers and Justin’s weed, but he lets Jesse have the first hit because he knows Jesse’s fucked up enough already. Jesse inhales deeply, just like Justin taught him, and doesn’t even cough when he breathes it out.

“You’re getting good at that,” Justin observes, and Jesse’s pretty sure there’s a little pride in his tone. Jesse likes that.

He hands off the joint. “Yeah, I’ll be a fucking champion in no time,” he says, leaning back against the cool brick wall. “My mom will be thrilled.”

“Your mom –” Justin’s voice is hollow as he holds in the smoke, and he exhales before finishing, “- has a hundred reasons to be proud of you. You didn’t need to take up pot for her approval.”

Jesse isn’t sure if it’s the weed or the booze that’s making it hard for him to hear that as a joke.

But he laughs anyway. “Yeah, I’m a real winner,” he says, rolling his eyes.

Justin offers the joint, holding it up to Jesse’s lips. “I think so,” he says, and his voice is quiet and Jesse’s lips are around the tip of the joint and Justin’s eyes are on his and Jesse doesn’t know what’s in this weed but the ground doesn’t even feel like it’s there anymore and it’s warm standing this close to Justin and –

There’s a clatter a few feet away from them as two barely-legal boys stumble out the bar’s back door. The noise makes Jesse jump, and he fumbles and the joint drops to the ground.

“Shit,” he says. “Sorry, Justin, maybe I can –”

Justin shrugs, crushing the orange tip with his heel. “No big.”

The boys are hanging off one another, hands deep into each other’s pockets and limbs curling around limbs. Jesse watches them for a moment, unable to look away even though he feels like he’s intruding.

Finally, one of the boys looks round. “Shit,” he says, elbowing the other in the ribs as he laughs. “Sorry, guys, did we interrupt something?”

“No,” Justin says. He takes a half step forward, just slightly in front of Jesse and blocking him from view. Jesse thinks he might be shaking.

“Go ahead,” the other boy calls, draping an arm around his boyfriend’s neck. “Kiss him. It’s fine. We won’t even watch.”

“We were just leaving,” Justin tells them, turning to face Jesse. “Come on, Jess,” he says, quieter. “Let’s just go.”

Jesse doesn’t know what’s going on here, doesn’t know if it would make more sense sober or if it would just be confusing, confusing all the time. He doesn’t know why Justin stepped between him and the kids and he doesn’t know why Justin is the first one he texts when something good happens to him and he doesn’t know why Justin thinks he’s a _winner_ , but he knows he likes these things. Drunk or sober, he likes these things.

“Come on, just kiss him!” one of the boys eggs.

So Jesse does.

***

Justin and Jesse finish the night off in Justin’s bedroom.

Jesse’s knees are around Justin’s hips and Justin lost his shirt ages ago. Jesse isn’t the type to stand for messiness and will probably pick it up later, fold it and put it over the back of a chair or in a drawer, but he’s had Justin’s mouth against his and Justin’s hands in his hair ever since they walked in the door, so he’s been a bit preoccupied.

Justin’s teeth leave bruises on his neck and Jesse’s hands are everywhere, anywhere he can reach. It’s not something Jesse’s thought about before, not _consciously_ , not even when he’s onstage and his head’s between Justin’s legs, but somehow none of that seems to matter. They’re here and it’s happening and it’s all okay.

Go figure.

Justin’s hands run down over Jesse’s sides and Jesse twists away a little, barely stifling a laugh.

“You ticklish?” Justin breathes against Jesse’s skin. Jesse can feel that he’s smiling.

“Maybe.”

Justin runs his fingers over the spot again, probably just to prove that he _can_ , and then moves on.

Their pants are off and Justin has Jesse in his hand, gentler than Jesse would have expected, and Jesse’s breathing heavily against Justin’s collarbone. His skin tingles and he thinks his chest might explode from the heat of it all.

“You okay?” Justin asks against his curls, and Jesse nods.

Somehow, with Justin, he always is.

***

The morning finds them twined together on top of the sheets.

Jesse wakes first, and he can feel panic set in almost as soon as he realizes that no, these are not his weird, creepy modern art pieces on the nightstand. He’s in Justin’s apartment, in Justin’s _bed_ , and he’s sore and tired in ways he never thought were possible for _anyone_ , let alone him. It’s new and scary and they were drunk, and Jesse tries to coach his heartbeat to slow down. Waking Justin up with a panic attack would not be good.

But then Justin rolls over and smiles, gently untangling his limbs from Jesse’s. “Hey,” he says, and the panic is gone.

Just like that.

“Hey,” Jesse says. He’s vaguely aware that he’s naked and that Justin’s naked and he’s pretty sure that this is not the norm for either of them. But Justin’s hair is sticking up in about seven different places, and his eyes are puffy and sleep-filled, and Jesse wouldn’t have missed out on that for anything.

“You sleep well?” Justin slides off the bed and pads towards his closet as Jesse tries his best not to stare too openly.

He nods. “You?”

Justin hops twice to get his pants up, and that may be the most ridiculous thing Jesse’s ever seen. “I slept great.”

There’s a minute or two of silence as Justin hunts down a shirt, and Jesse wonders what’s next. Does he shower? Does he leave? Why isn’t he panicking and fleeing right about now?

“Is this weird?” Justin asks suddenly, tugging a sweater on over his head.

“What, your shirt?”

“You and me.” Justin leaves it at that, simple, undefined.

Jesse pauses and considers for a second. “No,” he says finally, almost a little surprised. “It isn’t.”

“Yeah, I didn’t think it was,” Justin agrees, and that’s that, really. He picks up Jesse’s button-down from the floor and tosses it onto his lap with a smile. Maybe it all is really that simple. “You want to get breakfast?”

“Sure,” Jesse says with a smile. “Breakfast sounds good.”

 _end._

**Author's Note:**

> Emily, I hope you enjoyed this! Thank you for prompting me to write a pairing I've never tried before - I ended up having a blast.
> 
> And many thanks go out to my wonderful beta Wandaplenn. All accurate locations in the Village are thanks to her.
> 
> Title taken from Anberlin's _"The Unwinding Cable Car"_.


End file.
